How half-orc names work in 5e
A half-orc's name announces which world they live in. Those raised among orcs carry orcish names, short and guttural, built to be barked in a war camp: Dench, Shump, Thokk. Those raised among humans usually carry human names, and some deliberately take a human name to move through human lands with less friction. Canon also notes the reverse move: a half-orc who wants to be intimidating leans into the orcish name precisely because of how humans react to it.
The grammar of a growl
Orcish names rarely waste a syllable. One or two beats, heavy consonants, and no soft landings: the names thud. Female orcish names follow the same pattern as male ones, maybe ending on a vowel but losing none of the gravel: Baggi, Yevelda, Shautha. There are no family names in orc tradition, so any surname a half-orc carries came from the human side or was earned as an epithet. The generator above respects that, pairing bare orcish names with optional earned tags.
Two names, one character
The strongest half-orc hook on this page: give your character both names, the orcish one and the human one, and decide who is allowed to use which. A fighter who answers to Karg in the wilds and Karl in the city is managing two reputations. A paladin who refuses the human name her mother gave her has already told you her whole story. Roll a batch above, take one name from each tradition, and let the party discover the second one mid-campaign.
Epithets instead of surnames
Since orc tradition has no family names, half-orcs who need a second name in human paperwork usually improvise one from reputation: the Maul, Ironjaw, of the Broken Tusk. These earned tags work like goliath honorifics with worse manners. If your half-orc carries one, decide who hung it on them, because an epithet from a war band and the same words from a city watch poster mean very different lives.
Sample names from this generator's half-orc list: Dench, Feng, Baggi, Emen, with clan or family names like Bloodfang and Ironjaw. Roll above for the full range, and click any result to copy it.